


2,539 Days

by HappinessisJuuzou (Moongirlx)



Category: Free!, Shelter: The Animation (2016 Short Film)
Genre: AU, Angst, Crossover, Established Relationship, Inspired by Music, Love, M/M, Major character death is IMPLIED but i guess that's kind of the point?, Memory Loss, Shelter- Porter Robinson, Virtual Reality
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-02
Updated: 2016-11-02
Packaged: 2018-08-28 17:32:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,056
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8455519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Moongirlx/pseuds/HappinessisJuuzou
Summary: It was foggy, how this whole thing had begun. He couldn't really remember what his life was like before this, he just missed it, it was a constant ache in his chest."Shelter" (Porter Robinson & Madeon) and Free! crossover.





	

**Author's Note:**

> If you haven't seen "Shelter" you should still be able to enjoy this fic as enough information will be given, but it is a six minute music video on Youtube that is definitely worth the watch. Click [ here ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fzQ6gRAEoy0) to watch it.
> 
> Feedback always welcomed and greatly appreciated. :)

_I'm_ _alone. But that doesn't bother me so much. I'm not lonely. I have this whole beautiful world, and it's all my own._ _As long as I don't focus on it, I'm okay. I've kept myself so busy that sometimes I forget to think about it. Sometimes I feel like I've forgotten how to think at all._

 

The aquarium was his favorite.

It was huge, towering above him when he stood in front of it, looking up at the building eagerly. It spanned an area bigger than the size of a football stadium. It was the biggest thing he'd created so far. The mountains and beaches had nothing on this.

It was his happy place.

He wandered through it everyday, the collection of marine mammals and fish changing each day. The one thing that remained constant were the penguins. All different types. He stayed by their enclosure for most of his visit, hand resting against the cool glass as he wished he could simply go through it and swim with them. He knew they weren't real, but just watching them splashing, swimming and waddling about brought a smile to his face.

Some days, there was a butterfly garden in an adjacent building to the aquarium. It had stained glass windows and was filled with stone benches and hundreds of different types of flowers and plants. He would sit on a bench, watching, fascinated with the way they fluttered their wings, ever graceful, the way they sucked the pollen from flowers so near by where he sat that he could see their needle thin proboscises. The way he felt a vaguely nostalgic feeling whenever he observed them. He couldn't put his finger on it, but something about the butterflies made him long for a home he couldn't fully remember having, a memory just out of his reach.

Nagisa's days were long. He slept more than was probably healthy, waking up in the late mornings just to wander about this world that belonged only to him. He tried not to check his tablet for messages, knowing he'd be alerted if, against all odds, he did receive one. But he usually failed.

"2,539 days without a message," the screen announced in bold lettering.

Nagisa sighed and rolled over onto his back, tapping on the screen and pulling up a view of the beach outside his room. The tide was low at the moment, so he pressed on an icon with the tip of his finger and then he was on the beach, seated in the sand just close enough so that the calm waves could wash up over his feet. He dug his toes into the wet sand, keeping the tablet securely on his lap.

He opened up a new window.

His fingers danced across the screen and a mossy bluff appeared behind him. If he'd looked, he'd have seen the pixels glowing and rippling in the air as the bluff grew up out of the sand without a sound. He didn't look. He just flopped back onto the sand, cradling the tablet to his chest.

 

 

It was foggy, how this whole thing had begun. He couldn't really remember what his life was like before this, he just missed it, it was a constant ache in his chest. There were some memories, buried so deep in his brain that he was unable to access them, but sometimes they reared their heads, teasing him with the possibility of coming back into his consciousness. But no matter how badly he wanted to drag them to the surface, they resisted, crawling back into the depths when he poked and prodded them.

He was always left feeling empty, longing for something unknown.

No matter how he changed the appearance, the climate, the location, of his world, none of it was ever enough to fill the hole in his heart. The mountains were pointless without someone to climb them with, the beaches were useless because he had no desire to swim alone. Even the aquarium would have lost it's shine some time ago, if it weren't for the butterflies. Being close to the graceful insects brought him closer to that place in his mind where he could _almost_ remember things. A hazy memory that was almost a full body sensation, of someone hugging him, comforting him, that made him shiver and change into a cozy sweater, knowing full well he didn't need it.

 

 

 

He checked his messages again. "2,574 days without messages," it said, almost seeming to mock him in it's straight forwardness. _You're alone_ , it seemed to say. 

He shook his head and closed out the messaging app with a tap of his finger that was almost too forceful, and threw the tablet aside, rolling over onto his stomach and hugging a pillow to his chest.

But he quickly tired of that, and so he reconciled his differences with the tablet and picked it up again, opening up a blank page. He put the end of the stylus between his lips, chewing on it slightly as he thought. And then inspiration grasped him, and his hand moved as if of his own accord.

Within minutes he was in the middle of a field of flowers, standing on a dirt road that ran through it. The colors all around him were so vibrant, the green of the grass, the pinks and yellows of the flowers that grew in bunches. The field was all that was visible for as far as the eye could see. He tucked the tablet under his arm and looked up towards the sky, a blue so brilliant that his eyes ached a little bit. He shielded his eyes against the sun's rays just as a monarch butterfly flew over his head, coasting along on the wind before lighting on a cluster of flowers next to him.

He was overpowered with a sense of déjà vu so strong that his head spun, and he quickly crouched down in the dirt. He set a hand against the ground to steady himself, and then, 

he

was

f

a

l

l

i

n

g

.

 

 

 

The ground simply fell away from under him, he tried to clutch at grass and dirt and roots, to find purchase with his fingers but that was crumbling too, and he was falling down a tunnel full of flicking pixels, catching and reflecting the light. It seemed as if he was falling forever.

And then, came the memories.

_There he was, running through the exact same field he had been in just a second ago. But he wasn't alone. He was running behind a man with blue hair, who was blushing and looking fiercely determined to ignore Nagisa._

And then he knew the name, mouthing it to himself for the first time in years. "Rei," he whispered, as he fell, slowly. There was no air rushing around him, he was just coasting down, the pixels swirling around him and breaking his fall.

_He was swimming in a relay with Rei and Haru and Makoto, and they were winning, and they were hugging each other and crying._

Tears were flowing freely from him now, but he couldn't feel them because as soon as he shed them, they were floating into the air, joining the dance of the pixels around him.

_He was graduating, walking across the stage in his powder blue cap and gown, waving at Rei, who was wearing the same cap and gown and watching him with eyes full of pride._

_He was hugging Rei, and kissing him, and they were walking to the train holding hands._

_They were in an apartment, the apartment they shared, watching on T.V. as the circumstances in Japan worsened, as a huge, menacing form lurked in the sky. Japan prepared for a collision._

_They were walking the streets with masks covering not only their mouths but their whole faces, to protect them from the deep gray of the air and the soot that covered their clothes that had to be stripped off the minute they got into the house._

_He watched from the door frame as Rei stayed up late working on something on his computer, something Nagisa didn't understand and was too afraid to ask. He almost didn't want to understand._

_Rei was distracted, always working. And when they had time together, there was a furrow between his brows. He was so, so worried all of the time. Nagisa knew living conditions were bad, but they would get better, right? There was no way that planet was actually going to collide with Earth._

_They were sitting on the couch, facing each other. Rei was stroking his fingers through Nagisa's hair and whispering something to him as tears rolled down his cheeks._

And then he was in the room, watching as he himself began to cry. He stood in the corner, his entire being glowing and made up of golden pixels as he watched the scene unfold before him.

He wished that instead of getting angry back then, that he had just reached out and touched Rei's face, his hair, throw his arms around him like it was the last time he was going to see him, because it was.

But instead

_he watched his own face go red and he watched angry tears fall from his eyes and he watched himself storm into the other room, leaving Rei sitting on the couch, burying his face in his hands._

_Then Rei was standing outside a space ship, watching it as it departed. His face was covered with a mask_ but Nagisa knew him, and he knew that he was crying.

His fingers twitched as he longed to reach out and grab onto him, but he was not really there, he could not grasp onto anything. 

He was falling again, and landing back in the field of flowers, his tablet thumping to the ground next to him.

He woke up the screen, looking at the blinking icon in shock. 

There was a message.

_Nagisa._

_From the first moment we met all I wanted was to be with you forever._

_I tried to push you away at first but I was unable to keep up that facade for very long._

_I watched the conditions in Japan worsen and worsen, and I knew I needed to do something._

_If I couldn't change them, I needed to protect you from the inevitable end all of Japan's residents would suffer._

_You are so special to me, Nagisa, more than you ever knew or ever will know._

_You inspired me to do great things, things I never knew I was capable of doing._

_But when you smiled at me, it was as if I could tackle any obstacle that was thrown at me._

_I only wish that I could have come with you, but as that wasn't a possibility, I did the next best thing._

_I ensured your safety._

_I hoped that you would forget, so the memories wouldn't hurt you, or weigh you down, but I know someday, the loneliness will overpower you, and you will remember._

_When the time is right, you'll read this letter._

_I love you, Nagisa._

_Rei._

He didn't know he was crying until fat tear drops fell onto the screen of the tablet and he hurriedly wiped them off with the sleeve of his sweater.

The butterfly landed on a flower near him, and he smiled, though tears still fell down his cheeks.

 

 

Nagisa sat, slumped over in a chair in the passenger seat of a space ship. His eyelids were closed, but his eyelashes fluttered with the movement of his eyes underneath them. Various tubes came out of his back, and his blond hair was grown out, to his shoulders, bangs in his eyes. The only noise that filled small area of the ship was a gentle beeping.

 

 

He picked a flower, and held the stem between his fingers, admiring the vibrantly yellow petals, as a calm breeze brushed his hair off of his face, drying his tears.

"I am lonely sometimes, you're right. I'm lonely all the time, actually. But I'll be okay. Because of you. You did everything in your power to keep me safe, and that thought alone, will encourage me to live on. Because of you, I know I'm not truly alone.

Thank you, Rei-chan."

 


End file.
